Indian Muslims Flee Homes After Rebel Massacres in Assam

May 4 (Bloomberg) -- Dozens of Muslim families fled their
homes in India’s northeastern Assam state where soldiers were
deployed to keep order after masked tribal militants gunned down
at least 32 villagers, mostly women and children.

About 300 refugees were living at a relief camp set up
about five kilometers (3 miles) from the worst-hit villages in
Baksa district, Khagen Sarma, Assam’s director-general of
police, said by telephone from Guwahati today. Some of the
victims bodies were pulled out of a river near the villages,
S.N. Singh, Assam’s inspector general of police for law and
order, said in a phone interview while updating the death toll.

Twenty-two people have been arrested in connection with the
attacks since May 1 in Baksa and Kokrajhar districts, where
gunmen clad in fatigues shot people using assault rifles and
torched homes. Rebels from the National Democratic Front of
Bodoland, which says it’s fighting for an independent homeland,
were responsible, according to police and local officials.

“The objective of this group seems to be aimed at starting
a full fledged communal conflagration,” India’s Home Minister
Sushil Kumar Shinde said in an e-mailed statement today. “The
forces on the ground will definitely control the situation,” he
said, while appealing to leaders of both the Bodo and minority
community to help maintain calm and peace.

Violent History

Assam has a history of violent unrest between indigenous
Bodo tribespeople and Muslims, who resettled there from what is
now Bangladesh. In 2012, ethnic clashes killed 80 people and
displaced more than 400,000, prompting the government to block
websites, censor social media, and ban bulk mobile-phone texting
to check the spread of violence.

The state government was worried the violence could spread
and authorities were trying their best to prevent it, Ranjit
Gogoi, Assam’s director of public relations, said yesterday.
Soldiers and paramilitary forces have been deployed in affected
areas and a curfew has been imposed.

The latest attacks involved about 40 Bodo militants firing
AK-47 rifles, and at least 35 houses belonging to Muslims were
set ablaze near Manas National Park, according to Assam police.

Fatigues, Masks

The assailants wore fatigues and black masks, police said.
The youngest victim was just “a few months old,” Sarma said.
Almost all of the missing have now been accounted for, he said.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in a statement condemned the
attacks, saying the government will seek to maintain order. The
administration also said relief camps are being set up.

The assaults may be a retaliation for a crackdown on the
rebels since January that killed 18 militants and led 45 more to
surrender, Assam police’s Singh said.

The Times of India reported yesterday that the incidents
may have been sparked by speculation the victims’ communities
voted for a non-Bodo candidate in national elections. The
newspaper cited a leader of the Bodoland People’s Front it
didn’t identify.